Communicating public avalanche warnings – what works?

Like many other mountainous countries, Norway has experienced a rapid increase in both recreational winter activities and fatalities in avalanche terrain during the past few decades: during the decade 2008–2017, 64 recreational avalanche fatalities were recorded in Norway. This is a 106&thinsp;% increase from that of the previous decade. In 2013, Norway therefore launched the National Avalanche Warning Service (NAWS), which provides avalanche warnings to transport and preparedness authorities and to the public. Previous studies suggest that avalanche warnings are used extensively in trip and preparedness planning and have a relatively strong influence on the decisions people make in order to reduce risk. However, no evaluation concerning how efficiently the warnings are communicated and understood has been done to date in Norway. Avalanche warnings communicate complex natural phenomena with a variable complexity and level of uncertainty about both the future and the present. In order to manage avalanche risk successfully, it is fundamental that the warning message can be understood and translated into practice by a wide range of different user groups. Users with little or no avalanche competence may need simple information to decide when to stay away from avalanche terrain, while professional users may need advanced technical details in order to make their decisions. To evaluate how different modes of communication are understood, and how efficiently the informational content is communicated, we designed and implemented a web-based user survey. The modes of presentation were based on the Varsom.no 2017 version (Varsom.no being the national portal for natural hazard warnings in Norway). We first used a panel of 110 experts from NAWS to answer the survey, and used their answers to establish the indented message of the avalanche warning. We thereafter received responses from 264 users and compared their answers to those of the NAWS experts for the different modes of communication. We developed a method, the comprehension effectiveness score, to test the comprehension. Our empirical analyses suggest that most users find the warning service to be useful and well suited to their needs. However, the effectiveness of a warnings seems to be influenced by the competency of the user and the complexity of the scenarios. We discuss the findings and make recommendations on how to improve communication of avalanche warnings.</p

Rethinking the heuristic traps paradigm in avalanche education: Past, present and future

This paper will review the emergence and adoption of decision heuristics as a conceptual framework within the avalanche research and education community and demonstrate how this emphasis on the heuristic decision framework has anchored and was critical in redefining the discussion around avalanche accidents. This paradigm has been a critical and meaningful step in recognizing the importance of decision making in avalanche accidents. However, in an attempt to reduce the incidence of fatal accidents, the adoption of these ideas within the wider avalanche community has overlooked some clearly stated limitations within the foundational work of the heuristic decision frame. With respect to the concept of heuristic traps in conventional avalanche education, the concepts are poorly operationalized to the extent that they are vague about what exactly they describe. The result is that as presently framed, they are of negligible value to avalanche education that seeks its basis on the best available information. We end with a discussion, and a call to action to the avalanche research community, of how we could move towards resolution of these weaknesses and add value to prior work on human factor research. Our aim is not to disparage the seminal, paradigm shifting work by McCammon, but rather draw attention to how it has been operationalized and how the industry needs to move beyond this paradigm to see further gains in our understanding of avalanche fatalities